By Martin Ekpeke
The Federal Ministry of Communications, Innovation and Digital Economy (FMCIDE) is facing severe backlash from tech stakeholders over a glaring breach of the federal government’s newly minted “Nigeria First Policy Agenda.”
At the center of the storm is the Minister, Dr. Bosun Tijani, whose recent $10 million partnership agreement with foreign platform Hello.cv under the 3 Million Technical Talent (3MTT) initiative stands accused of sacrificing Nigeria’s digital identity and data sovereignty on the altar of foreign branding.
Under the agreement, Hello.cv will provide 20,000 3MTT fellows with professional profile packages valued at $500 each. The bundle includes an AI-powered job search agent, a professional CV writer and a personal .cv domain name.
However, the inclusion of the .cv domain, which serves as the official Country Code Top-Level Domain (ccTLD) for Cape Verde, directly contradicts the “Nigeria First Policy Agenda, approved by the Federal Executive Council (FEC) on May 5, 2025.
The policy agenda explicitly orders all Ministries, Departments, and Agencies (MDAs) to prioritize local goods and services to spur domestic growth and reduce foreign dependency.
By forcing Nigerian tech talent onto Cape Verdean digital real estate, critics argue the Minister is actively promoting a foreign nation’s digital footprint at the expense of Nigeria’s indigenous .ng domain.
“While Dr. Tijani’s ability to secure a $10 million partnership to upskill youth is commendable, the execution of this deal reveals a profound oversight in strategic national interest,” said Dr. Adebunmi Adeola Akinbo, CEO of DNS Africa Media and Communications.
He breaks down the Minister’s policy blindspot into three critical vulnerabilities: They are surrendering digital identity, hypocrisy in data sovereignty and cybersecurity and starving the local ecosystem.
According to Dr. Akinbo, a nation’s ccTLD (.ng) is not just an extension of a website URL; it is sovereign digital territory. Thus, forcing 20,000 of Nigeria’s brightest upcoming tech minds to build their professional portfolios on a foreign country’s domain (.cv) sends a damaging signal. He argued that instead of projecting Nigeria as an emerging digital superpower, the ministry is subsidizing the global visibility of Cape Verde’s digital identity.
“The FMCIDE has repeatedly championed cybersecurity and data localization. Yet, by transferring the personal profiles, data, and career histories of thousands of Nigerians to a foreign registrar, the Minister has bypassed local safety nets. Nigeria has zero regulatory jurisdiction or legal recourse over how Cape Verde’s registry handles, protects, or monetizes this data,” he added.
The Nigeria Internet Registration Association (NiRA), the custodian of the .ng domain, possesses more than enough capacity to host millions of users. By completely cutting NiRA out of the loop, the ministry missed a massive opportunity to inject value into its own domestic registry, choosing instead to enrich a foreign infrastructure.
Being blunt in his assessments, pointing out that simple compromises could have saved the deal without violating federal policy, Dr. Akinbo said: “The number of people that will be onboarded to the .cv ccTLD is huge… It is very improper, very, very improper. If their brand is Hello.cv, no problem, they should come and buy a hello.cv.ng… We can onboard three million or five million Nigerians to the .ng domain name.”
Also commenting, Ugonma Egwuatu, ICT & Data Protection expert at ECAM Global Services, noted:“There should be explanations regarding the backend: what are they doing with the data of the people that visit the sites? Are they trying to phish data? Are they trying to sell data? These are questions that need to be asked.”
Emmanuel Amos, CEO of Programos and boss at Innovationbed-AI Academy, on his part noted that this blunder highlights a systemic failure within Nigerian governance: a complete lack of institutional resolve and stability in executing the government’s own laws.
Even NiRA, maintaining a diplomatic but firm stance, released a statement stressing that the goals of the 3MTT program could easily have been met while utilizing local infrastructure, such as the .ng learning management system.
This blunder highlights a frustrating trend where Nigerian policymakers launch robust, patriotic policies, only to violate them at the first sign of a foreign partnership.
Fortunately, because the rollout only began last month, the window for amendment remains open. To salvage his reputation and uphold the law, Dr. Bosun Tijani, who is yet to react to these accusations, must urgently renegotiate the terms with Hello.cv. The foreign firm should be mandated to host Nigerian fellows on a .ng subdomain like fellow.3mtt.ng or hello.cv.ng, ensuring that Nigerian data stays under Nigerian oversight, and that the “Nigeria First” policy remains a reality, not a slogan.